Alexei thought on these words for a moment, then shook his head. “She wanted me to leave her, to go away. And so I shall. That will mark the end of it.”
“And where will you go afterwards? If you fail in your mission as you most surely will, Russia will not be safe for you.” He glanced around the dismal room. “You do not want a life like this.”
“I will return to my business in England and then take Jake home to his people.”
“Ah, yes. I had forgotten your bodyguard although not long ago, he was much in my mind.” The count went to a table that was cluttered with papers and books. He rummaged through the confusion, apparently seeking a particular item. Finally, unable to find what he looked for, he threw up his hands and spoke irritably. “General Simanova charges me so much for these pitiful quarters, I can only afford a woman to clean once a week. I live in chaos and cannot find even a letter when I need it.”
“You perplex me again, Count David. What letter?”
The Count leaned against the table. “It was from an old friend from the days of the Czarina. A Frenchman and a Jesuit. He had recently made a voyage to the antipodes and wrote me many pages of news and impressions. From what he said, I judge it will not be safe for Black Jake in Van Diemens Land.”
“Tell me more,” asked Alexei, troubled.
“I know very little, of course; but I trust the observations of Father Robin as I would my own. He wrote that there is a growing mood for murder on that island. The treatment of the convicts becomes daily less humane, and there are many settlers who are crying for the slaughter of the entire native race.”
With renewed anger, Alexei slammed his fist into the palm of his hand. “So. I am to deliver my best friend into the maw of death.”
“Don’t take him there, Alexei. He…”
“You don’t know Black Jake, Count David. He would rather be free and hunted in his own land than live to a comfortable old age anywhere else in the world.”
The old scholar nodded, unsurprised. “He believes that freedom is worth dying for. Perhaps it is. I wonder how many millions of Russians will have to die before this wretched slavery of the serfs is ended?”
For a while longer the men talked of Russian politics, and then the conversation drifted into family matters and reminiscences. Count David prepared tea in an old silver samovar that bore his family crest. It was one of the few reminders of his once elevated position. As the afternoon wore on, Alexei grew more and more solemn. Finally, he apologized for his distraction and made haste to depart. Before leaving he embraced the old Count and, feeling the man’s frail-boned body, knew that they would never meet again. As he was leaving, he placed a bag of gold coins beside an open book. Count David would find the money later and accept it gratefully, Alexei knew, but without any loss of what pitiful pride remained with him.
When he returned to the center of the city, Alexei Stephanovich was blind to the beauty around him. His anger had dissolved in concern for Count David and then been rekindled in a new rage at what might await Jake in Van Diemens Land. The unfairness of the world, the cruelties of men against men, obscured the beauty of the twilight for him. Already a gloom as black as night had descended on his soul.
Chapter Twenty
Katia spent the evening in the sitting room with Natasha Filippovna.
“By Our Lady, Katia, you do make me nervous with your pacing like an old farmer. Sit down here and get warm. A lady must cultivate stillness. How many times have I told you that?”
Obediently, Katia sat. Her pale slender hands twisted in her lap fretfully. “Where is Mary?” she asked though the hour of the child’s bedtime had long passed. Ashamed, she realized her thoughts had been so full of Alexei since their fatal interview she had forgotten Mary entirely.
“Asleep, of course. Nurse put her down about an hour ago. Since her doll disappeared, the poor lamb is sleeping more and more, I’ve noticed.” Nikki shook her head in vexation.
After a moment staring at Nikki’s busily embroidering hands, Katia said, “Has the stiffness left your hands entirely, Aunt?”
She was so pleased with herself she didn’t notice Katia’s agitation.
“Almost,” beamed Natasha Filippovna. “I am working this chasuble now in gratitude to the Little Father. I hope he will wear it when he says Mass.”
“I am curious, Aunt. How does he cure you?” She did wonder this; but more than anything, Katia was thankful for the distraction her aunt’s reply might offer.
If Natasha Filippovna would just keep talking, perhaps she would not think about…Alexei! If only he had tried to charm her out of her evil mood she would have changed her words so quickly. I love you, Alexei Stephanovich, she would have sobbed. I am unworthy, but I love you still.
Aunt Nikki chattered on; once more she seemed her old garrulous self. Katia nodded appropriately, but she was thinking of what Alexei might have replied had she summoned her courage to confess to her relationship with Oleg. She tried to imagine poisonous words spoken in his strong gentle voice, but she could not.
Despite everything, there was still a little hope in Katia. It was this that made her miserable.
“The Little Father has the Power.” Natasha Filippovna crossed herself.
“You’ve said that before, but how great is this power? Will you be completely well one day? Will the breathlessness, the indigestion, all disappear as wondrously as the stiffness in your hands?” For a moment she forgot about Alexei. Aunt Nikki’s stiffness did appear to have lessened. For the first time, Katia was genuinely interested in the famed healer priest.
Natasha Filippovna seemed a little uncomfortable, and did not want to meet Katia’s curious blue gaze. She was thinking about the recurring numbness in her left leg. Could the Little Father purify that discomfort as he had her hands? She believed what she told Katia, that he had the Power; but she also knew that in order for this power to work, she had to be fully and heartily repentant of her sins, spiritually cleansed, and in a state of Grace. Would she have to break her oath and give up everything if she wanted to be completely well again?
She didn’t want to think about that. After eighteen years the sacrifice was too much to contemplate.
Lately it seemed that more and more of her waking thoughts were full of forbidden subjects. Oleg and Katia, the Princess Anna, the bargain, the emeralds, the pain. For a moment, she thought it might almost be better to be like Mary, never fully awake or aware of the life around her.
“The Little Father asked about you last night, Katia. He wants to see Mary. He means it when he says he believes he can cure her.” What was the matter with Katia anyway? She seemed drained of feeling and weary with the weight of the world.
Natasha Filippovna didn’t want to think about that either.
Katia sighed. “If only I could believe that life is as simple as you make it sound, Aunt.” She picked a bit of thread from the carpet and made a ball of it between her fingers. She tossed it toward the fire. “What is to become of us, Aunt? You and I and little Mary?”
The girl’s simple plea brought sudden tears to Natasha Filippovna’s tired eyes. She embraced Katia warmly and heard herself trying to explain. “You are a convent child, Katia. There is much you do not know, much you are not ready to understand. With time, the knowledge will come; but until then, I must do what I consider best for you. I must keep the promise I made. Believe me, Katia, your mother will send for you one day. I promise that all your questions will be answered by her then.”
“My mother!” cried Katia, with mocking laughter, her almondine eyes bright with anger. “When the day comes that we meet, that fine lady and I, I know that I will hate her. She had me caged for thirteen years…”
“There were reasons, Katia.” Natasha Filippovna’s heart had begun to race.
“There can be no reasons good enough. She caged me and kept me innocent in a world that punishes innocence. Will she expect my gratitude for that? My love?” Katia hissed the question.
Nata
sha Filippovna fidgetted, her breath coming in short gasps as she sought the words that would explain it all and make Katia forgiving. In exasperation, she inadvertently stabbed herself with the long sharp embroidery needle. “Holy Mother!” she cried out, seeing the ruby bead on her finger.
Katia watched her aunt shake and suck the injured finger. A long time seemed to pass; and when her aunt said nothing further, Katia rose and, smiling slightly, crossed to the door of her bedroom. Turning back for a moment, she said coldly, “I will never forgive her. And I will never understand.”
When Oleg came to her that night, she put up scant resistance; but his caresses brought forth no response but the same icy stillness. Her lack of enthusiasm angered Oleg especially that evening. He furiously slapped the back of his hand across her thighs. The heavy gold and gemstone rings bit her flesh cruelly. She cringed and her body moved against his.
“So, Katia, is it pain you respond to?” Again, his hand bruised her; but Katia steeled herself and did not move this time.
“Bitch!” he cried in rage, shoving her away. “You’re sick, Katia. Half a woman.”
“If I am, it is you who made me this way.” She was sneering at him openly, almost as if she dared him to do his worst and be done with her. “In matters of the flesh, I am your own creation, Oleg. Don’t forget that.”
“And I suppose with someone else you would be different?” Oleg looked sideways at her where she lay half covered beside him. “I saw you and my cousin engaged in spirited conversation this afternoon. Perhaps you would prefer his touch to mine?” Katia looked away, her expression grim. “But he has no time for convent girls. At this very moment,” Oleg laughed salaciously, “Elizabeth is with him in his room across the palace. She is an accomplished bed companion, Katia. Perhaps you would care to watch a while for some inspiration? God knows you need it!” When Katia tried to sit up, he pushed her back into the pillows.
‘Couldn’t he wait a day?’ Katia’s thoughts screamed. Alexei was a devil, a two-faced monster. All men were the same. Just puppets on the strings of their carnal natures. She understood that now. Alexei, Oleg, the men in the priest’s hole, Leo: they were all variations on the same treacherous theme. ‘I will never love anyone again,’ she swore to herself.
“You disgust me, all you noble Romanovs!” She spat the words at Oleg. “You and your cousin are both corrupt. I find nothing to choose between you.”
All at once, Oleg was very tired of Katia. He felt no desire for her, only an irritable indifference. He was reminded of a dozen diplomatic problems large and small with which he had been plagued since spring. The talk of Alexei Romanov had upset him. Oleg thought how the Czar had never praised him for apprehending his renegade cousin. Was this a deliberate oversight, an insult?
He got out of bed and pulled on his trousers. He reached for the dressing gown which he had flung across a chair near the bed and put it on. The ache in his groin was replaced by a jagged line of pain between his eyes. He rubbed the place with his knuckles, but it did no good. Lately, he had been visited by these headaches more and more frequently. Sometimes it seemed his head would explode from the distress. At the applewood sideboard, he poured himself a glass of vodka and drank it in one swallow. He drank another, but the pain did not diminish.
He sensed Katia staring at him and knew that his behavior perplexed her. He took some small pleasure in this and in knowing that she feared him. He went back to the bed. She had drawn the lacey-edged sheet over herself, but he pulled it down to reveal the bruises left by his hand. Idly, he touched one reddened spot.
“My patience is wearing thin, Katia. I do not like to start what I cannot finish. Be wise. Do not force me to another object lesson that you know will upset you.” He went to the door. “And incidentally, should you have any girlish daydreams about my cousin, forget them. Sleep with the angels, Katiana.”
A few steps down the hall, he saw Mary’s door ajar. On an impulse he stepped in. The nursery was lighted by a single oil lamp that cast a hazy coppery glow over the face and body of the sleeping child. He walked closer to her trundle bed and watched for a moment the slow rise and fall of her breast as she slept peacefully. Carefully he pulled back the blankets until he could see her full length. Her long cotton nighty had ridden up during the night and he saw a stretch of thigh the color of clover honey. When she stirred and turned in her sleep he stepped back into the shadows; but she did not awaken and he moved near again. Deep in the satiny pillows her face was framed with long yellow hair and she wore an expression of innocent trust that made Oleg catch his breath. He reached out to touch her, but a fraction of an inch from her breast he pulled back. Not yet, he cautioned himself. Her midnight loveliness moved him in a way that no female had since Katia’s entrance into his life. Mary would be perfect one day. But not yet.
He stood for several minutes longer watching the sleeping child, but gradually concerns of business and diplomacy intruded his voluptuous thoughts, and so he turned away and softly left the room.
In his dressing room a few moments later, Oleg roused his valet from a doze beside the dying fire; and as the man helped him prepare for bed, Oleg made an effort to force Katia out of his thoughts. It was imperative now that he give his full attention to political affairs. Of late, his public and private lives had become dangerously intertwined. It was Katia’s fault. Her body had enthralled him and dazed his senses out of working order. She had become a liability to him and yet…
‘But I can’t send her away,’ he thought. ‘Not yet.’ Despite Katia’s incredible resolve against passion, her continuing frigidity attracted rather than repelled him. It was like a call to combat, a summons no true male could refuse.
His valet helped him up into the high canopied bed.
“Leave a light,” Oleg commanded. “And bring my writing box and the papers in the leather envelope.”
He tried to concentrate on the documents concerning the Russian-Turkish provinces of Wallachia, Moldavia and Serbia. They were at the heart of this business between Czar Nicholas, Alexei and the King of England. The Czar wanted King George’s help in the stupid business.
Oleg threw the papers down. It enraged him to think how Alexei—that treasonous scum!—would do work that Oleg, who was a true and loyal Russian, could do as well. For years, Oleg had honored and served his country and Czar faithfully; for that he received only heavy-handed warnings from the Czar’s bloodthirsty agent. How dare Myshkin order him to keep Alexei here in the palace as—of all the preposterous things— his alleged guest? But then, that was what the Czar wanted; and everything must be as the Czar wished. The old fool was peering nosily into every corner of Oleg’s life, and there was nothing Oleg could do to stop him. He wondered if it was all part of Myshkin’s plan for Elizabeth to warm Alexei’s bed and keep him occupied. Oleg would not put anything past the devious mind of Myshkin.
When Oleg thought about Elizabeth, his head seemed to fill with blinding white heat and work became impossible. Elizabeth would have to be silenced somehow; she knew too much, and she was too reckless to understand the limits of so much knowledge. She claimed to have put documents in the hands of someone with influence with the Czar. Oleg knew she might be bluffing, but he dared not risk it. He could take no chances just now. Not until he had regained the Czar’s favor and was once more above suspicion.
This coolness from the Czar confounded Oleg completely. Myshkin was seeking to advance himself; that explained his behavior. Elizabeth wanted Alexei and revenge against Oleg for his past philandering. But why had the Czar turned against him? Oleg knew his ruler did not approve of his lifestyle. But then, he disapproved of anyone who was not as rigid and cold as he himself was. Oleg perused an official letter from the Czar. It had just recently gone out to all the members of Court and nobility and announced that henceforth Court dress was to be in the traditional orthodox Russian style. The Czar was a prude who liked his women shaped like haystacks. Was it any surprise that he disliked Oleg Romanov who was a known
connoisseur of beautiful women and the epicurean life? Rifling through his papers, Oleg found a gold embossed invitation. It was from the Czar and his family. It invited him to the first gala of the winter season, a masquerade ball.
Oleg smirked when he recalled the name he had heard applied to the Czar a day or two before. Prince Davidov had called him Colonel Ramrod, and Oleg had to admit that the name suited. He glanced at another group of papers, unable to bind his attention for long to any subject but his own problems. These documents dealt with the trouble in the Caucasus with the Persians. As if the Turks were not enough challenge, Nicholas was determined to fight the Persians as well!
‘We’ll soon find out whether Colonel Ramrod, has what it takes to lead Russia,’ thought Oleg. A victory in the Caucasus would secure the Caspian ports, and once and for all Russia would have the sole right to maintain a fleet there.
Oleg tried to concentrate on the diplomatic repercussions of war with the Persians. But his mind would not stay on it. Now, when he needed all his wits about him, he was finding it harder and harder to keep his thoughts on one subject without being drawn into the distractions of his private affairs.
He thought of Mary and then of Katia. He imagined her sleeping face, the relaxed curves of her young body. Out of all his confusion, one idea did seem clear. He would not be bested by a convent child. He would break her before he tossed her aside.
Chapter Twenty-one
The next morning around eleven, before he began his diplomatic round of appointments, Oleg paid a visit to a member of the Spanish ligation, Count Hernando Sevilla.
Under normal circumstances. Prince Oleg tried to avoid the company of the aged count for the man’s reputation was so notorious that it often contaminated those who knew him socially. Oleg knew that he was taking another chance by paying a call at the Count’s home; Myshkin, that verminous royal thug, might be having him followed; so might Elizabeth. But Oleg believed, or so he told himself several times over in the carriage that morning, that during the night he had reached an important decision; and it was now vital that he act upon it. As the pale eastern light fingered its way between the slats of heavy shutters on his bedroom window, he had convinced himself that it was Katia who caused his temples to throb agonizingly all the night long. It was Katia who had caused him all his woe with Elizabeth; and he would not now, he thought, be out of favor with the Czar if it were not for Katia. He recalled the old znakhara who had stopped their sleigh train months before on the road to Petersburg. The crone had spoken drivel but somewhere in the heart of her message there was a truth he had come to see that night. A cloud of bad fortune had descended on him since Katia Danova entered his life. If he wanted to recover his losses with Czar Nicholas and Elizabeth, he must be rid of that bad luck. Done with it and with Katia.
The Frost And The Flame Page 19